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Hello! I hope you all are having a good week! Happy spring! What have you done this week to welcome spring? On Sunday I planted some seeds. Hopefully they come up and once the weather gets warmer, they can be replanted in my garden beds in the back yard! Of course, this morning it was 10 degrees! So the replanting wont happen for quite some time!

On Saturday I ran 4.5 miles and then Adam and I went to Empire Farm Brewery for a Beginner Vinyasa Flow Yoga Class. It was a great class! I got warmed up and was very relaxed throughout the class. The teacher was really awesome. She is from O Yoga in downtown Syracuse. Afterwards we had lunch at the brewery. Their food is always good! I had a turkey club sandwich which filled me up for a while!

I love that these types of classes at breweries, art museums, healthy eating establishments, etc. They are becoming popular. It’s a lot of fun and makes going to one of the classes a little less intimidating than going to the studio. For people who aren’t as serious or knowledgeable of the type of exercise, it gives them a sample of what the classes are like at a place where they may have been before.

On Sunday Adam and I went to Onondaga Lake Park for our long run. We knew the main trail of the park would be plowed and snow free and from there we could take the road for the rest of our miles. The road leaving the park has a good size shoulder that we didn’t feel worried about the on coming traffic. I love the views of Onondaga Lake Park and running on the road leaving the park gave us a lot to look at. We ran off the main road a few times into some really nice communities. I love looking at houses, so this run made the time go very quickly. Luckily at the park, even though the bathrooms were closed due to the winter weather, they had plenty of porta-potties available along the trail. I drank coffee just before our run and had to make more stops than usual to pee!

After 16.1 miles, we took some time to walk a little bit and get a good stretch in! It’s so important to make sure you’re stretching after workouts! It helps your muscles and saves you from being tight later on. The next day, I felt really good. My body wasn’t sore or tight. After long runs, I have been taking a Turmeric supplement. Sometimes after a long run, my legs swell up and the Turmeric stops that from happening. As you can see, it also has a lot of other great health benefits!

While we were walking and stretching we made sure to drink a lot of water! Throughout the day we also drank more than usual to help our bodies recover. For lunch, we stopped at Core Life Eatery. It felt good to eat such a healthy meal afterwards. I had the Southwest Grilled Chicken and Wild Rice Blend. It had wild rice, chicken, spinach, avocado, jalapenos, tortilla strips, tomatoes, black beans, scallions, corn, shredded white cheddar and a lime cilantro jalapeno vinaigrette. It was delicious and very healthy! Of course, I LOVE their juices! I had the beet lemonade.

It’s so important to properly fuel your body when you are exercising! This morning I ran 6.5 miles and I made oatmeal for afterwards. They say you should have something to eat within 30 minutes of a workout. My oatmeal this morning had oatmeal, chia seeds, chocolate P2B, cinnamon, almond milk, and sliced banana. It was delicious and so filling! This is one of my go-to breakfasts when I am working out.

Last summer when Adam and I were training for our marathon, we would make this same recipe (we would usually add vanilla or chocolate protein powder) the night before our run. In the morning when we were getting ready, we would put it in the freezer to make sure it would stay cold during our run. We put it in a cooler in the car so we would have after our stretching. Cold oatmeal in the summer time is the best! It would fill us up and give our bodies the nutrients we needed so that our bodies did not go into starvation mode. The first time we did a long run and did not have food readily available after our run, I felt like I had the worst hang over of my life because my body needed food and water.

In addition to having food available for immediately after a long run, I also carry with me energy chews and start eating them after about mile 10 or so. I eat them slowly while I am running so that I’m slowly getting the benefits from them and I don’t get sick from eating too much during a run. I have also heard of people taking protein bars on their runs.

These are my favorite energy chews, but there are a TON of different kinds!

It’s important to try out different ways of fueling your body to see what works best for you!

Hope you all have a great weekend!

Marathon Training Week 11

Monday- 3.2 Miles
Tuesday- 6.3 Miles
Wednesday- 6.4 Miles
Thursday- Rest (much needed after a lot of shoveling!)
Friday- 4.4 Miles
Saturday- 4.5 Miles
Sunday- 16.1 Miles
All of the miles were on the treadmill except Sunday. Our weather has been crazy and we got a ton of snow last week!

Saturday morning Adam and I went to a local restaurant, Core Life Eatery for a free Yoga for Runners class. The class was led by Sophia Tashkovski, a local yoga instructor. We started with a small group run with some other participants taking the class. This was my first time running in a group that was not a race. I really enjoyed chatting with other runners and hearing about their experiences in races they have participated in during the run. I enjoy running, but have only done a small handful of races so far. While I enjoy participating in races, they can be packed with people which doesn’t always allow you to run your best. They can also be expensive to do. I know they are expensive to participate in because they are expensive to put on, and often they are supporting a charity of some type. However, running for me is often just a free way to get exercise, spend time with Adam and Porter, and done on my own time. Since I have started running I have done 1-3 races each year.

The yoga class was amazing! It was an hour and fifteen minutes of great stretching and learning new yoga positions and techniques, while working on form and practicing some positions I have become familiar with. The teacher, Sophia, was very knowledgeable about the muscles runners should pay close attention to.

The restaurant that put on the class, is a newer restaurant in the area that serves delicious, healthy food. Probably my favorite part of what they offer is their juice selection! My two favorite juices they offer are the Cranberry Cayenne Lemonade and their Beet Lemonade! I’m not going to lie, sometimes I go there just for the juice. We were getting hungry, so we stayed for lunch! I had the steak, bacon and bleu cheese salad and Adam had the Tuna Poke bowl. Both were very tasty! It felt great to have such a healthy meal after our workout.

It was a beautiful day on Saturday, so after we got back home from Core, we grabbed Porter and headed to Onondaga Lake Park to run a little bit more and have a relaxing walk! We ran 2.5 more miles and then walked about 5 miles. There were tons of people at the park enjoying the beautiful day!

I wrapped up my week 6 marathon training on Sunday morning with a 12 mile run. This was the longest run I have done in quite some time! It felt great! The sun with bright and beautiful and the weather was perfect! Looking forward to more long runs in the near future!

I hope you all had a great weekend! If you’re in New York, I hope you were able to dig yourself out of all the snow we got between last night and this morning! I think I woke up to more snow this morning than all of January! In January we had a record low of 8 inches in Syracuse! Syracuse has not seen this little of snow in January since 1950! Pretty crazy stuff! These pictures are from my walk this morning with Porter.

I was unfortunate enough to get yet another cold last week. I am never one to get colds! The cold medicine in our house expired in 2011- that’s how little we get colds. Needless to say we had to purchase some new meds. I have been trying to drink a ton of fluids, take my Emergen-C tablets to get some extra vitamin C, resting, going through tissues like there’s no tomorrow, and sucking on cough drops. I finally feel like I’m on the upswing! Friday and Sunday I actually had to skip my runs. I felt awful for skipping them. Friday was only a 3 mile run but Sunday was suppose to be a 10 mile run. I am going to try to do a 10 mile run this week to make up for it. Those are the important runs that make a lot of difference for me. There was just no way I could have done them.

This weekend Adam and I had planned to go to the Finger Lakes for some wine and beer tasting and we scheduled a brunch at our favorite winery for Sunday morning. Our hotel reservations could not be refunded, so we still went and tried to make the best of it!

We left Saturday after we both got our 4 mile runs in. We started with Prison City Pub & Brewery. Their Mass Riot IPA was named the best IPA on the East coast. They have a limited supply of it, and just tapped a new keg on Saturday morning. Adam is a huge fan of IPA’s so we stopped there for lunch on our way to the Finger Lakes. I stuck with some green tea. Their food is delicious! I had a butternut squash soup with a grilled cheese and apple sandwich. Definitely helped my throat!

On Sunday we slept until 9AM. I can’t tell you the last time I slept in that late! I am usually such an early bird! We got around and went to brunch at Fox Run Vineyards. They had the most amazingly beautiful spread! Everything looked like it was from a magazine! All of the food was delicious! They had a pastry and yogurt bar that you could go up to anytime to get food, and then you ordered your main meal with the waitress. We both had eggs benedict with crab cakes. We each got two tickets for their blanc de blanc which you could have plain or you could have cranberry juice or orange juice added to. This was the second event we have gone to at this winery and they do not disappoint!

After brunch, the rain had started to turn into snow. We decided it would be best to head home. I’m glad we left when we did. Once we got home, we already had a couple inches of snow.

Good morning! Happy February to everyone! The groundhog predicted 6 more weeks of winter so I’m trying to make the very best of it. But I’m still waiting in anticipation for warmer weather. I feel like a little kid waiting for presents on Christmas morning!

Week 3 Marathon Goals

I wrapped up week 3 of marathon training last week. It feels good to be accomplishing goals and staying focused!

Monday-Rest day!
Tuesday- 6.3 Miles
Wednesday- 5.5 Miles
Thursday- 6.1 Miles
Friday- 3 Miles
Saturday- 4.4 Miles
Sunday- 9 Miles

Monday I took full advantage of my rest day. Porter and I had a nice long relaxing walk in the morning. I truly enjoy drinking my coffee and listening to my audiobook or a podcast while walking with Porter in the morning. For a while, we worried about Porter’s poor paws when we were walking on very cold mornings. Every once in a while he would hop on three paws because one was too cold and hurt to touch the ground. We would cut our walks short so it wasn’t torture for him. But he loves his walks in the morning! He’s a true sniffer and is always excited to check out new footprints in the snow. Our neighbor told us about this wax he uses on his dog, Brooklyn, so that the coldness of the ground doesn’t affect Brooklyn. The day after telling me about this wax, our neighbor brought me over a tin of it for Porter. He spoils Porter with treats all of the time, and it was super nice of him to get the wax! Porter is not a fan of putting it on his paws, but it definitely helps protect this feet!

I ran everyday inside on the treadmill this week except for Sunday. It was a cold and snowy week. Sunday was still cold, but I couldn’t fathom running 9 miles on the treadmill. At least on Sunday we could run in the daylight. So we bundled up and went for a run. We took Porter with us for about 6 miles, then dropped him off at home and kept going.

One of my favorite post run breakfasts last week was Chobani Dulce De Leche yogurt with fresh fruits! It was so delicious! Chobani has a good amount of protein in every cup which keeps me fuller longer and is great for recovery after exercise. This one has 12 grams of protein.

New Years Goals

Last week we moved into February, which means moving into a new month to meet my new years goals. In January we went to a couple new restaurants. We went to Viva Taqueria in Ithaca, NY with my mom and aunt for my birthday. Mexican is one of my favorite types of food and I really enjoyed that restaurant. We also went to Notch 8 for my birthday. I loved the atmosphere at Notch 8! We ate at The Evergreen downtown Syracuse which has a fantastic beer menu and some yummy food!

We also went on a couple new hikes! We hiked at Clark’s Reservation in Jamesville, NY. We also hiked a new waterfall in Ithaca, Potter’s Falls on Six Mile Creek. We did the Creekwalk downtown Syracuse. I’d say we did really good on the 1 new restaurant and 1 new hike a month goals!

I did a lot of searching for Century Rides that I am interested in signing up for. There are some good ones out there, but I haven’t quite decided yet. I am hoping to officially sign up for one this month to lock it in. There was one in NYC that I was pretty excited about, and the website has been down. Hoping it comes back up soon!

On the left hand side of this post there is a new link you can click to subscribe to my blogs. This way, every time I post, you’ll get an email with the post so you can keep on reading! 🙂

How are you doing on your New Years Resolutions/Goals? Are you looking forward to anything coming up in February?

If you know me, you know I have a true love for food! Some days I get my motivation to workout from thinking about what I want to eat that day. The more I exercise, the less guilty I feel when I treat myself. Life is all about balance.

Last night I made a fall/winter favorite in our house enchilada stuffed spaghetti squash. Here is the recipe I use, of course you can change any ingredients you may like.

Cut a spaghetti squash and cut it in half. Scrape out the seeds and rub a little olive oil on the inside. I put a little cayenne on the inside of mine because I like spicy food, but it’s optional. Put the squash in the oven at 350 degrees for about 50 minutes. When it’s done it should be soft on the inside.

To make the filing mix the 1 can of black beans, 1 cup of cooked quinoa, 1 cup frozen corn, 1 can enchilada sauce, 1/2 of a diced onion, 1 cup salsa.

When the chicken breasts are cooked, chop them up and add the chicken to the filling mixture.

Put the filling inside of the spaghetti squash.

Top with Monterey Jack shredded cheese.

Bake for about 10 minutes. Turn on the broiler and leave in for about 1-2 more minutes.

Serve!

This meal usually lasts us for 2 nights. The leftovers are just as good! We have done this recipe with chicken, ground turkey and ground beef before. You can use different cheese or beans if you like, add cilantro or peppers, skies the limit! This makes for a delicious, filling and healthy meal!

Sorry, I was so excited to eat it I forgot to take a picture of the final product. 🙂 It was yummy though!

Hello Everyone! It has been my dream for a few years now to start a blog so, I’m finally doing it!

It was about 3 years ago that I was frustrated with myself for being over weight, inactive and unhealthy. I decided to do something about it! For Christmas 2013, my husband and I gifted ourselves a Concept 2 rowing machine. My husband had enjoyed rowing for exercise in the past and I needed something I could do at my own pace to work up endurance.

That year, we set a goal to row to the Bahamas (figuratively). We mapped out the approximate amount of meters it was from Syracuse, NY to Nassau, Bahamas by water. We scheduled a cruise to the Bahamas in the early fall to celebrate our accomplishment. We hit our goal a couple weeks before we left for vacation! We were so excited for accomplishing our goal together. In addition to cooperatively reaching our goal, I lost 30 pounds in the process and had a yearning to continue my journey with healthy eating and exercise.

After a few months of rowing under my belt, my husband and I were walking our dog (Porter) and my brother’s dog (Yeti) who we were dog sitting at the time. We were trying ever so hard to tire our energetic young pups out! After a while of walking, I asked my husband if he was interested in attempting to run with the dogs. I had never been a runner in my life, but thought it might be worth a try. I truly surprised myself when we ran over a mile that day! It went by very quickly and I was excited to run again and again after that day increasing my mileage as I continued to run.

The next year, I began training for my first half marathon. I was hooked on running and couldn’t get enough of it! For Christmas 2014 my husband and I gifted ourselves a treadmill so that we could continue to run in the winter. Since then, I have run a few 10Ks, 2 half marathons and one full marathon. This May, I will be running my second full marathon in Buffalo, NY.

As I continue my journey with exercise, I have learned the importance of properly fueling my body to prepare it for all of the challenges I put it through. I am looking forward to sharing with you my journey as I continue this healthy life style I have learned to love!